FISA Court

The footnote could pose the biggest legal threat to those involved: Former Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe and Former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein also signed renewals. Failing to notify federal judges about the conflicting role of a source that the FBI used to authorize intrusive spying methods against a private U.S. citizen just because he volunteered to work for the wrong (in their view) presidential campaign runs afoul of many laws, to say nothing of violating Carter Page’s constitutional rights. For now, it doesn’t appear as though their malfeasance will be relegated to merely a footnote of this historical scandal.

Fired FBI Director James Comey, former CIA Director John Brennan, former FBI General Counsel James Baker and several others are already in the crosshairs. Given U.S. attorney John Durham’s reputation for uncovering and prosecuting FBI corruption in the Bolger case, which one of the Spygate rats is going to flip first?

We can ask: Was the information the FBI relied on true? Were the FBI's representations to the court accurate? The answers do not bode well for the bureau. It might have been entirely lawful to submit so much wrong information to the court and as a result be granted a warrant to wiretap a former Trump adviser in pursuit of a crime that had not actually occurred. And, given the extensive redactions, there is still much about the warrant that the public does not know. But even now, with the help of the Mueller report, the public knows that FBI was wrong, big time, about Carter Page. And that cannot create much confidence in the rest of the bureau's long and wide-ranging investigation of the president's 2016 campaign.

Our friend former U.S. Attorney Joe diGenova had a pithy assessment of where Attorney General Bill Barr’s investigation into whether the Obama-inspired spying on President Trump and his campaign were properly predicated: "Comey is ultimately screwed,” said DiGenova.

Andrew McCabe would have us all believe that HE believed the Steele “dirty dossier” and other purported contacts between the Trump campaign and various Russians or Russian-affiliated persons, even though he knew almost all those contacts were set-ups orchestrated by the Hillary Clinton campaign, the FBI and various other organs of the Obama administration.

We already know that the Obama administration abused the existing FISA protections and undertook surveillance of Sharyl Attkisson and many of President Trump’s political associates, and maybe even then-candidate Donald Trump as well. How long will it take before the Democrats’ surveillance regime moves beyond the border zone to encompass the entire country?

What research on the Steele dossier has slowly revealed is the scope and logistics of the information operation designed to sabotage an American election. Players include the press, political operatives from both parties, and law enforcement and intelligence officials.

The prosecutorial harassment of Donald Trump, those related to Donald Trump or in Donald Trump’s “circle” is an outrageous perversion of justice. What's more, the opprobrium heaped on the Trump family by the establishment media and popular culture has also claimed entirely innocent victims, such as Josh Trump of Delaware.

It seems that James Comey and Hillary Clinton are infected with the same memory loss virus that affects so many of the elite university graduates who make up DC’s political class, leading one to conclude it is not memories, but ethics and integrity that they are missing.

We agree with the President that there is a “lingering stench” at the Justice Department and FBI, however, it is unclear whether Rod Rosenstein will resign, be fired or stay in his position. The question is, is firing Rosenstein a set-up as Sean Hannity suggests, or something that needs to happen right away, as Judge Jeanne Piro and Laura Ingraham have urged.

In response to a Judicial Watch lawsuit it has been revealed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court held no hearings on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) spy warrant applications targeting Carter Page, a former volunteer advisor to the Trump campaign.

Enough of the drip drip drip leaking of reports, let’s have this out in the public sphere. I don’t trust the Justice Department and FBI of their own volition actually to be fully transparent at the moment, so they must be compelled to do what is right. The 2016 election was a clear referendum on the government elites, the ruling class, that want to manage our lives. They lost. We won. And we want answers.

Senator Rand Paul was right, President Trump should revoke the security clearances of former CIA Director John Brennan and anyone else involved in the unmasking of Trump associates, the phony FISA warrant applications and the spying on the Trump team.

It is time for Congress and the media to stop chasing the phony charges that Trump “colluded with the Russians” and start asking what changed during the Obama years that allowed this extensive cyberattack on America to go unchallenged, and with such ease, and why were our cybersecurity operators told to “stand down.”

We urge CHQ readers and friends to contact Attorney General Jeff Sessions (202-514-2000) to demand that Peter Strzok be fired for dereliction of duty for failing to investigate the information presented to him by the Intelligence Community Inspector General as documented by Rep. Louie Gohmert at yesterday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing.

Yesterday, Rep. Jim Jordan grilled Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein about the documents he has been withholding from Congress, as Rosenstein smirked his way through the questioning. But Rosenstein may not be smirking now as the House passed a resolution demanding he comply with its subpeonas by July 6.

The IG report is a blistering rebuke of James Comey, who has spent recent months on a book tour promoting his brand of “ethical leadership.” Now, Inspector General Michael Horowitz has confirmed that his office is investigating Comey for his handling of classified information.

After reading the Inspector General's report it is clear to us that many of the contortions the FBI and Department of Justice went through weren’t to protect Hillary Clinton, they were to protect Obama from being exposed as a liar and an accessory in Hillary Clinton’s misdeeds.

Even though the report found blatant bias and that some senior bureau officials exhibited a disturbing “willingness to take official action” to hurt Trump’s chances to become president, Strzok’s boss, Comey, had no “political bias.” Right.

Was there good faith in the beginning? Did political appointees and career agents rightfully pursue leads to see if something was there? Or was the investigation always an insurance policy? And, more importantly: Did anyone really believe the Steele dossier?